Related topics: heart

Protein 'passport' helps nanoparticles get past immune system

The body's immune system exists to identify and destroy foreign objects, whether they are bacteria, viruses, flecks of dirt or splinters. Unfortunately, nanoparticles designed to deliver drugs, and implanted devices like ...

New energy source for future medical implants: sugar

MIT engineers have developed a fuel cell that runs on the same sugar that powers human cells: glucose. This glucose fuel cell could be used to drive highly efficient brain implants of the future, which could help paralyzed ...

Pacemaker channel discovery could lead to better heart drugs

The mechanism by which fat-related molecules called lipids regulate pacemaker ion channel proteins, which help control the heart rhythm, has been revealed in a study from researchers at Weill Cornell Medicine.

Powering a pacemaker with a patient's heartbeat

Implantable pacemakers have without doubt altered modern medicine, saving countless lives by regulating heart rhythm. But they have one serious shortcoming: Their batteries last only five to 12 years, at which point they ...

Researchers debut battery-less pacemaker

A wireless, battery-less pacemaker that can be implanted directly into a patient's heart is being introduced by researchers from Rice University and their colleagues at the Texas Heart Institute (THI) at the IEEE's International ...

page 1 from 4

Artificial pacemaker

A pacemaker (or artificial pacemaker, so as not to be confused with the heart's natural pacemaker) is a medical device which uses electrical impulses, delivered by electrodes contacting the heart muscles, to regulate the beating of the heart. The primary purpose of a pacemaker is to maintain an adequate heart rate, either because the heart's native pacemaker is not fast enough, or there is a block in the heart's electrical conduction system. Modern pacemakers are externally programmable and allow the cardiologist to select the optimum pacing modes for individual patients. Some combine a pacemaker and defibrillator in a single implantable device. Others have multiple electrodes stimulating differing positions within the heart to improve synchronisation of the lower chambers of the heart.

This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA